


Hit Me With Your Best Shot

by SerenStone



Series: Destiny 2 Prompts [15]
Category: Destiny (Video Games)
Genre: Fireteam Cloud, Fireteam Clutch, Fireteam Clutter, Gen
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-02-26
Updated: 2020-05-13
Packaged: 2021-02-27 22:41:28
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 9
Words: 3,827
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22913398
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SerenStone/pseuds/SerenStone
Summary: Prompt: Hidden Citizen's cover of "Hit Me With Your Best Shot"Prompt: Mescaliner's song "Crestgrinded Tidalgust"This is a series examining moments of adaptation and change in Silla's life.Status: Ongoing
Series: Destiny 2 Prompts [15]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1583290
Comments: 10
Kudos: 2





	1. "Scorched Earth" by Hidden Citizens

Silla ducked around a Captain’s leg then dragged a knife through its hamstring and took off, heading for cover. She could hear Vynn off to her right, hurling insults as often as he pulled the trigger. Katya-7 was somewhere in the middle of the chaos of the Fallen Silla was getting some distance from. She was grateful they had come with her on this mission. It was her first against the Fallen and she was sure it would have gone badly if she’d been alone. 

Once she got a rock between her and the fight, Silla turned and pulled at the energy within her, sighting down a burning barrel and putting a golden bullet into the eye of the Servitor bearing down on them. The Golden Gun still felt strange in her hands, too new to be familiar. As the Servitor shuddered to a stop and exploded, she grabbed her rifle and began picking off the Vandals at the edges of the fight. 

The fight settled into a sort of rhythm after that, she thought. Katya-7 handling the writhing mass of the swarm, Vynn hemming them in and burning out the occasional Captain, while Silla flitted around the edges to eliminate the riflemen and pick off stragglers. Silla had only just spotted the Vandal at the far side of the conflict when he raised his rifle to aim at a Vynn who was crouched under Bluejay’s healing Light. Bluejay.

Silla was moving before her mind fully processed what was happening. She heard the shot, the howl of rage, felt the heat of Daybreak erupt and detonate. Her own hands felt like cracking on their grip on her rifle so she dropped it, feeling the shock of energy disconnecting. Galvanized, she leapt for the Vandal and an Arc Staff formed for the first time between her hands and she brought it down into a concussive burst of electricity. She watched the terror in the Vandal’s eyes form, expand and sharpen, and then vanish as its eyes ceased to exist. Turning, she spun the staff in her hands to catch and redirect incoming fire and then she leapt into the fray at Katya-7’s side. It was time to end this.


	2. "Darkfield" by Caspian

Ducking under a bush, Silla watched the Cabal move down the road toward Trostland. Opening fire on so many would be asking for trouble, the sort you didn’t get away from without Cayde-6-levels of luck and ingenuity. This would be tricky. 

Pushing past her hesitation, she made herself still. Just because she’d never moved as a Nightstalker didn’t mean she couldn’t do it now. Focusing her mind, she called up the memory of Vynn’s description of Void, the scent of vacuum that lingered around Ikora Rey, the weightlessness of space. 

The Phalanxes fell first, the power packs on their backs shattered. The Gladiators went down next. Silla’s focus shattered when one of the Gladiator’s Severus nearly went through her armor. The Legionaries turned their attention to the now-visible Guardian. Even as she dove to the side she snatched up her pistol and took out any power packs she could see. She could feel the Void curling around her again and she darted away to finish off what was left of the Legionaries in the confusion. 

If, when she walked away from the fight, she walked with one foot in the Void, there was no one to see it.


	3. "Black Blade" by Two Steps from Hell

Silla sprinted across the surface of some forsaken stretch of the Moon. She called up the Golden Gun and aimed over her shoulder as she continued to run, firing repeatedly into the swarm of Hive behind. When she had enough distance Bee transmatted the Voidstruck at her side and they sped away. She drove to the top of the nearest hill and dropped off the Sparrow, her rifle already in her hands as she began picking off the Knights as quickly as she could. 

When the pair of Ogres appeared at the edge of the valley, Silla sighed and dropped the rifle. Reaching into the energies surrounding her, her hand closed on a barely-there bow and she flung herself into the air, firing an Anchor and following it quickly with every Shadowshot she could conjure up. Landing hard, she reached for her new grenade launcher, The Colony. Without hesitating, she emptied the magazine, reloaded and emptied it again. 

Face blank, she shouldered her rifle and watched the tiny robots engage their targeting AI and scuttle into the Hive swarm and begin exploding. She picked off the few thralls The Colony hadn’t quite caught. When the valley below her was still, Silla took a deep breath, collected her gear, and stowed it. Bee summoned the Sparrow again and they took off for her next target.

As she drove, she thought of a deceptively frail-seeming Hunter dressed all in white - moon camouflage. She thought of the way the edge to the woman’s gaze always seemed hollow, the reliance on weapons that could be easily repaired in the field and would never jam. She thought of endless expanses of dead dust, days spent underground with only Hive for company.

“Bee, send Aura a message for me. Text only. _I get it._ ”


	4. Clutch 1/5

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Prompt: Meeting Fireteam Members, 1/5
> 
> Lishan Screen Grab: https://luffthearts.tumblr.com/post/615777997218299904

“Niles!” Bee cheered at the top of her speakers’ volume and bolted away. Silla looked up from the book she was reading and peered over the edge of the roof to find Bee chattering happily with a Ghost in a shell with tendrils. She rolled off the roof and strolled to the Ghosts. “Niles, Niles, this is Silla! She’s my Guardian!”

“Hey,” Silla said breezily, enjoying Bee’s excitement. “Nice to meet you.”

“Oh, of course you found yourself a Hunter,” the Ghost turned to bob a nod to Silla. “You treat this one well, yeah? She’s a good bean.”

“Do my best,” Silla agreed immediately. 

“Where’s Lishan?”

“Somewhere in Ikora’s way, I’m sure,” Niles’ shell shrugged in stages. A woman strode toward them, Awoken, pale with flawless skin, green hair, and luminous teal eyes and Silla felt her skin heat. “Or in mine,” Niles corrected. “Lishan Gall, this is Silla Faer. The little Bee found herself a Guardian.”

“Hello,” Silla managed, relieved her voice didn’t crack.

“Hello,” Niles spoke with a feminine voice. The woman nodded to Silla and glanced at Niles. “Niles does my speaking for me. Bee, congratulations.” Bee twirled and chirped happily and Lishan’s lips curved into a smile and Silla desperately wanted that smile pointed at herself. “Hunters have a habit of vanishing forever,” she continued, turning to point a decidedly less pleasant expression at Silla. “Don’t.”

“Nah. Too predictable. I’ll figure out something else for a retirement plan,” Silla quipped, serious but unable to look away from the dark cyan-stained scowl.

“Do that. I’ll be with Ikora if you need me, Niles.” She turned and sauntered away, her robes swirling round her hips.

Bee waited all of five seconds to start cackling, Niles joining in shortly afterward. “Shut up,” Silla hissed, blushing fiercely. 

“Awesome,” Niles said gleefully. “This is going to be magnificent.”


	5. Clutch 2/5

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Prompt: Meeting Fireteam Members 2/5
> 
> Pryderi Screen Grab: https://luffthearts.tumblr.com/post/615778036405682176
> 
> Bonus Katya: https://luffthearts.tumblr.com/post/615778892119179264

“Silla,” Katya’s voice pulled her out of a doze and she dropped easily out of the tree and jogged to the EXO’s side. “Pryderi Keen and Rangi. This is Silla and Bee.”

Silla nodded at the Awoken Titan and Ghost as Bee manifested next to her. “Heya,” she said brightly. 

“Hi,” Pryderi shifted on his feet. “Uh, Katya, what-”

“Mobility training,” Katya said as if that explained anything. “Get to it.” She walked away.

Silla grinned and shook her head at Katya’s abruptness. “Race?”

His gaze cut to her, sharpening into something competitive. “You’re on.”

They pelted up and down the EDZ soccer field for hours and Katya didn’t have to lift a finger to get either of them exhausted. 

“I’m bringing Vice next time,” he told Katya before leaving. “She stands still too much.”

“Do it. Silla can run her into the ground too.” Silla preened at the praise.

“Oh, I look forward to it,” he agreed.


	6. Clutch 3/5

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Prompt: Meeting Fireteam Members 3/5
> 
> Rathna-8 Screen Grab: https://luffthearts.tumblr.com/post/615778082171863040

Silla was flat on the ground underneath a bush, waiting for the Psion to give her a clear shot when it sprouted a burning knife from its eye and an EXO Hunter ripped into the rest immediately around it. Rapidly cycling targets, Silla picked off the Cabal at the edges of the party, only emerging when they all were dead.

The EXO whirled to face her, dropping into a crouch before recognizing her Light. “You?” they asked, pointing at the dead around the edges. Silla nodded. “Nice.”

“You too,” Silla said. “I’m Silla.” The EXO nodded and began looking through Cabal pockets. Deciding the stranger wouldn’t introduce themself unprompted, Silla asked, “What’s your name?”

“Ratha. Eight.”

“Good to meet you.”

The EXO grunted, apparently having found what they sought. They nodded at her once more before transmatting away.


	7. Clutch 4/5

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Prompt: Meeting Fireteam Members 4/5
> 
> Eidel "Vice" Varela screen grab: https://luffthearts.tumblr.com/post/615778015345016832

“Oh come on, Vice,” Pryderi teased, easily evading her.

“My way works too you know,” the human Titan growled, trying to keep up. “We don’t all have to be lightfeet.” 

“Could save your life though,” Silla noted idly, her training knife resting against Vice’s collarbone.

“Damn it,” the woman turned and tackled Silla to the ground. 

“Good. She needs to learn how to wrestle,” Katya called from where she was having a conversation with Darbi. 

“Cool,” Pryderi threw himself on the ground. “Get her, Vice.”

Silla laughed and learned.


	8. Clutch 5/5

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Prompt: Meeting Fireteam Members 5/5
> 
> MU-3 Screen Grab: https://luffthearts.tumblr.com/post/615778054572228608
> 
> Full Fireteam: https://luffthearts.tumblr.com/post/615778097731682304

“MU, come here!” Vice called, gesturing toward the table she and Silla and Lishan sat around.

“Why should I?” the EXO called back, his feet propped up on his own table in the corner. “I’m comfortable.”

“Ugh. He’s moody. He’s not going to move,” Vice groaned, turning away. 

“I like moving,” Silla said brightly and hopped up to join MU at his table. “I’m why. This is Bee. I’m Silla Faer,” she held her hand out across the table.

“MU-3, Marikit’s around somewhere.” He glanced at her hand and sighed, sitting up to shake it. “Happy?” he bellowed across the dining courtyard.

“Not with you,” Vice yelled back.

Silla frowned at the interaction as MU settled back in his chair and put his feet back up. “That’s why I don’t bother. Never satisfied,” he noted.

“Seems to be how things are around here,” she agreed. “Gets to you too?”

He leveled a much less dismissive look at her. “Aren’t you brand new? Why are you already tired of it?”

“Cause I can see,” she shrugged. He laughed. “Why are you tired of it?”

“Ain’t no reward for being a Guardian. Not really. I like all my parts and pieces where they are. Don’t see why I should go around letting bad guys rearrange them just because someone else wants help with something.”

“It’s not worth it if you’re not getting something for the effort,” Silla said slowly.

“Yeah. And the Vanguard doesn’t offer anything I want.”

“Mhmm,” she hummed. “What do you want?”

“Ha!” he snorted and shook his head. “I have itemized lists of my lists of wants. You got all day?”

“I’ve got all week,” she countered.

MU settled into his chair and looked her up and down. “Well then. Let me tell you about myself.”


	9. Support

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> This happens after the chapter called Shadow in (Stay).

MU-3 watched as Silla frowned at the screens before her. Each screen displayed a different fireteam member’s HUD from their last mission. She had each comm line hooked up to the speakers and all going at once. Her eyes darted from screen to screen, and he spotted the indentation in her cheek that meant she was chewing on the inside of it. Beside her Bee spun idly in the air as she flagged key moments and decisions for Silla’s review. 

He’d known Silla for less than a year, and had only worked with her personally for a few months but already he felt she knew him better than anyone he’d ever known and he included Marikit in that assessment. Something about the way Silla looked at people, saw through them, and she knew them better than their other half. 

Not that he’d had a very good relationship with Marikit before Silla had recruited him. Rikit had already given up on him by that point, believing in the lies MU perpetuated about himself: the laziest, most selfish person you’ll ever meet. He was lazy, he was a glutton, he was a hedonist. But he would move, would act if he had reason. The facade of laziness was a mask to hide behind so no one would see his fear. 

Silla had taken one look at him and wanted him on her fireteam anyway. Eventually she’d pulled him aside and said that she wanted him for that fear, that instinct. That she needed it, needed him to have that fear to keep them all safe. And then she’d taught him how to run away. She’d taken his cowardice and turned it into a tool for their survival. If ever there was need, he would take the Ghosts and run with the only goal of surviving long enough to bring the Ghosts back to the others. 

At the start of the year, he’d hated himself and hated Marikit for ensuring he couldn’t just end it. Now? He still had days where it was all he could do to keep his frame functional. But he didn’t hate himself. He knew what he could do; he knew he wasn’t worthless. He knew Silla saw him as he was and had been able to see this version of him in the wings. He tried to repay the favor. Pay attention to the smallest cues, be ready at all times. 

Somehow, this meant he was the only one in Clutch who seemed to remember she was just as much of a person as the rest of them. Lishan and Vice both seemed to think Silla was a machine, that her decisions cost her nothing. Niles seemed to know better but the rest all either followed Lishan or kept quiet about it. Sometimes he would catch Rathna watching with something like regret in her face but she never did anything about it and refused to talk about it when he tried to bring it up. 

Then she stopped training them with games, her laughter evaporated overnight, she stopped losing her helmet, and when he did see her face her eyes were foreign and set deep in sleepless bruises. He’d done his best to be near her as much as possible, as she would allow. She’d vanish for days at a time but always kept up with their lunch schedule, training sessions, missions. With Bee’s help he’d started inviting himself to mission review and he couldn’t help but wonder why Lishan wasn’t there as Clutter team lead. 

“You’re consistently improving,” she pointed out suddenly, gesturing to the datapad in her hand displaying Rikit’s statistical breakdown of the mission.

“Or maybe Rikit’s biased,” he deflected easily.

“Against you, definitely,” she nodded. “Good point.”

MU rolled his eyes. “Good leadership.” Silla hummed as her glowing eyes went to Lishan’s screen. Her cheek was back between her teeth and she swiped at the hair that had come loose from her braid to fall into her face. She hadn’t so much as mentioned her dad since she changed. “Want to talk about it?”

“Good leadership?” Silla’s tone was near enough to amused that he almost didn’t follow through.

“Whatever’s got you so wound up.”

She shot a smirk over her shoulder and he could see the mask in it. “You think mission stats don’t do it for me?”

“No.” He watched the mask slide off her face till the smirk was a grimace. “You don’t have to, but I’d listen if you did.”

“Not my story,” she sighed, turning to face him. One hand toyed idly with the corner of the datapad. “It’s not that I don’t trust you.”

“Wouldn’t be about me whether you told me or not,” he shrugged. “Just. You changed a while ago and I thought it would pass but it hasn’t so.”

She shoved at the loose hair again. “Yeah. I had hoped it would pass quickly but, well. At least there’s stuff to do in the meantime.”

“Like sleep,” he pointed out.

“Nah,” she grinned and it was almost real. “Sleep is for people who got the job done.”

“Might need to pare down your jobs then,” he said mildly. “You usually get things done real fast. If these jobs are taking this long to get done maybe even you need help.”

Silla tilted her head, eyes boring into him. She looked imperious: her posture near perfect, her chin lifted just so, one foot slightly behind the other, muscles deceptively relaxed. “Problem?”

“No! Not like-” he backtracked quickly. “Like I said, leadership is good. I meant just that if you wanted some help I’d try.” Her posture softened slightly and her head tilted in the other direction, expression quizzical. It wasn’t the first time he’d realized Silla was more of a predator than a people person; it wouldn’t be the last. “I’m here because I want to be available to help. Can’t help if I don’t know what needs doing,” he managed. 

Bee twirled across the space between her and Silla’s shoulder and bumped gently into her Guardian. MU was touched at the show of trust. When Silla looked back to him from her Ghost, her posture was still perfect, her chin held just so, but she wasn’t trying to hide her exhaustion. “I don’t know what help I need,” she admitted slowly.

“Okay,” he nodded. “Why don’t you tell me what you’ve got on your to do list and we can see what we come up with.”

“Right, right,” Silla nodded and pushed her hair from her face. “Well, there’s always fireteam missions and training. I’ve got reading to do, research. I’ve got meetings. Need to keep working on large and small scale solutions.”

“Solutions?”

“Large and small scale,” she nodded. “How do we address the issue of the Darkness? How do we prepare for potential famine?”

He blinked at her. “Those both sound large scale to me.”

She shrugged. “Coming up with examples on the spot isn’t ideal.”

“So, you’re trying to solve the Darkness all by yourself?”

“No,” she shook her head. “But I need information to begin to be prepared to lead my team against it.”

“Oh,” he breathed, suddenly understanding why he had to run. That wasn’t small. That wasn’t a last ditch idea to try and save their lives. She was planning on him saving them, banking on it. Banking her own survival on his. When he pulled his attention back to the present she was watching him, waiting. “Okay. What else?”

Finally the smile she offered him was something real, even if it was one he hadn’t seen before. She began to explain how she broke down what upcoming challenges that she could see. From her perspective, both the Fallen and the Cabal might eventually be turned to allies, or at least no longer enemies. Her primary concerns were the Darkness and Hive and Taken, the Scorn, and the Vex. Osiris and Asher Mir were the experts on the Vex. Eris Morn knew more about the Hive than nearly anyone alive, though Shry knew quite a bit herself.

As for the Darkness, Silla had a list of things she wanted to bring to Ikora (could they take Ghaul’s cage technology and repurpose it toward the pyramids; is the Pyramidion simply a similar shape or is it somehow tied to the Darkness). One of Silla’s appointments coming up was with a Techeun to discuss paracausal entities. Silla was even keeping an eye on the safety of the Drifter of all people. MU readily volunteered to carry the questions to Ikora.

In terms of allies, resources, and territories, she had decided to trust Shry with getting Failsafe off Nessus before the Leviathan finished consuming the planetoid. Supposedly Rasputin was working on a plan to get the Hive off Mars and repelling the Cabal had not been difficult up to this point. Earth, however, was poorly defended and ultimately vulnerable to another attack at any time. Furthermore, the Last City’s infrastructure was woefully lacking in readiness for another crisis.

“That’s a lot,” he said when she finally trailed off. They sat on the floor with several datapads between them and each of the screens on the wall tuned to different maps or star charts as visual aids to their discussion. “You’ve been thinking about all of this the whole time?”

“Kinda? Not well, early on but,” she sighed. “I decided that if I couldn’t hunt myself I wasn’t suited to hunt anything. Applied the idea to the Vanguard pretty quickly after that.” 

“So you’re training Clutch against the ways you would hunt us,” MU said slowly. 

“Exactly,” she nodded. 

“So you _do_ have a plan to kill us,” he grinned, referring to a joke Vice had made during one particularly grueling training session. 

“Of course,” she said as if it was nothing. “If I didn’t have an idea of how to approach hunting any one of you I wouldn’t be able to make the call outs I do or arrange the team such that they can cover each other.”

“You know most people don’t think like that, right?”

“So?” She growled, pushing at her hair again.

“Oh for- Come here. Let me fix it.”

Her eyes widened but he didn’t get the chance to read the rest of her expression before she turned and slid across the floor so that she was in front of him with her hair in easy reach. Bee turned to watch. Grateful he was wearing gloves so her hair wouldn’t catch in his joints, he gently unfastened the end of the braid and combed it out with his fingers. He didn’t remember learning to braid but he knew how, weaving strands over and under each other with portions added here and there to bring all the hair into a single coherent shape. 

MU wondered then if that wasn’t what Silla was trying to do with everything she saw in the solar system. Taking the strands that she could see and finding out how they moved around and behind and over and near the other strands. Using the strands she could see to feel out the movements of those she couldn’t. Was she looking for the bigger picture or for her place in it? 

As he came to the end of the braid he realized that they had both gone quiet. He tied off the braid with the same strip of leather and rolled the end up and into the base of the braid against her skull as he’d seen her do. Reluctant to stop touching her and ever victim to his own whims he curled one hand around her shoulder. They sat in that stillness for a vulnerable moment until finally she sighed and slouched back to lean against him.

“Thanks,” she spoke softly.

“Yeah,” he said. “Whatever you need.”


End file.
